Movies: Ismail Merchant

A saga of class relations and changing times in an Edwardian England on the brink of modernity, the film centers on liberal Margaret Schlegel, who, along with her sister Helen, becomes involved with two couples: wealthy, conservative industrialist He...

A rule-bound head butler's world of manners and decorum in the household he maintains is tested by the arrival of a housekeeper who falls in love with him in post-WWI Britain. The possibility of romance and his master's cultivation of ties with the N...

When Lucy Honeychurch and chaperon Charlotte Bartlett find themselves in Florence with rooms without views, fellow guests Mr Emerson and son George step in to remedy the situation. Meeting the Emersons could change Lucy's life forever but, once back ...

After his lover rejects him, Maurice attempts to come to terms with his sexuality within the restrictiveness of Edwardian society....

While visiting her sister in Paris, a young woman finds romance and learns her brother-in-law is a philanderer....

His wife having recently died, Thomas Jefferson accepts the post of United States ambassador to pre-revolutionary France, though he finds it difficult to adjust to life in a country where the aristocracy subjugates an increasingly restless peasantry....

40 international directors were asked to make a short film using the original Cinematographe invented by the Lumière Brothers, working under conditions similar to those of 1895. There were three rules: (1) The film could be no longer than 52 seconds,...

Clarissa Dalloway looks back on her youth as she readies for a gathering at her house. The wife of a legislator and a doyenne of London's upper-crust party scene, Clarissa finds that the plight of ailing war veteran Septimus Warren Smith reminds her ...

In 1930s Shanghai, 'The White Countess' is both Sofia—a fallen member of the Russian aristocracy—and a nightclub created by a blind American diplomat, who asks Sofia to be the centerpiece of the world he wants to create....

The passionate Merchant-Ivory drama tells the story of Francoise Gilot, the only lover of Pablo Picasso who was strong enough to withstand his ferocious cruelty and move on with her life....

India, 1825: the country lives in mortal fear of cult members known as the “Deceivers." They commit robbery and ritualistic murder. Appalled by their activities, an English military man, Captain William Savage, conceives a hazardous plot to stop them...

Set during World War II, an upper-class family begins to fall apart due to the conservative nature of the patriarch and the progressive values of his children....

An aging silent movie comic star throws a lavish party to try and save his failing career....

A small-town eccentric opens a café in her decaying home....

Adam Verver, a US billionaire in London, dotes on daughter Maggie. An impecunious Italian, Prince Amerigo, marries her even though her best friend, Charlotte Stant, is his lover. She and Amerigo keep this secret from Maggie, so Maggie interests her w...

A bored lawyer and a suffragette vie for the attention of a faith healer's charismatic daughter....

Anne is investigating the life of her grand-aunt Olivia, whose destiny has always been shrouded with scandal. As Anne delves into the history of her grand-aunt, she is led to reconsider her own life....

Spanning twenty-four hours, HEIGHTS follows five New Yorkers challenged to choose their destiny before the sun comes up the next day....

Ismail Merchant's feature directorial debut addresses a subject close to his heart: the expressive Urdu language of Northern India, in danger of extinction as political trends and modernization obscure its contributions to Indian culture. Merchant 's...

When her husband's arrest leaves her penniless, a woman accepts an invitation to move in with a strange couple....